ASU Team Develops AI Tools for Enhanced Arizona Emergency Response
Arizona is strengthening its capacity to respond to emergencies with the help of artificial intelligence developed by Arizona State University researchers. A $1.7 million grant from the Arizona Board of Regents (ABOR) is funding the project, which aims to equip the Arizona Department of Emergency and Military Affairs (DEMA) with advanced tools for predicting and managing various disaster scenarios.
The project is led by Maj. Gen. Kerry Muehlenbeck, director of DEMA, and Paulo Shakarian, an associate professor of computer science and engineering in ASU’s School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence. Shakarian’s expertise in neurosymbolic AI, which combines symbolic reasoning and neural networks, will be central to the project.
GeoGraphVis, developed using geospatial insights, provides information to emergency responders.
Shakarian explains that the project will use several AI techniques, including logic programming and machine learning, to analyze past events and predict the likelihood of future disasters. The goal is to create algorithms that help emergency planners deploy the right resources at the right time.
“Second- and third-order effects, or the mid- and long-term consequences of disasters, are very difficult to account for when you do emergency management planning,” Shakarian explains. “One of the important ideas here is that the algorithms need to anticipate these effects so that state planners can pre-position assets to get ahead of problems that can arise.”
This project is particularly important because it focuses on cascading disasters. Shakarian and his team are working to develop software that can anticipate how one event can trigger a chain reaction of calamities.
The project team includes Hua Wei and YooJung Choi, both assistant professors of computer science and engineering, as well as WenWen Li, a professor of geographic information science, and Ted Senator, a distinguished member of the research staff in ASU Research Enterprise, who is serving as a liaison with DEMA. Li will integrate geospatial data with AI insights to create visual models of disaster scenarios. Senator will apply his experience in leading the development of large-scale AI systems to help the software align with DEMA’s current systems.
Ross Maciejewski, director of the School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence, emphasized the importance of the collaborative effort.
“We’re honored to be a part of this partnership,” he said. “This team exemplifies our dedication to advancing transformative research in ways that benefit our communities and our state.”
Senator believes the investment in advanced AI will pay off for Arizona residents. Shakarian sees the work as an example of how research can benefit local communities. “The key thing here is that this work is going to directly impact the state,” he says. “This grant is about giving the public access to the innovative outcomes of the research produced by Arizona-based universities.”
